Ranked: These are the world's largest money managers

The world's 500 biggest fund managers now control over $80 trillion of money, according to research released today.

Total assets under management swelled by 5.8 per cent to $81.2 trillion by the end of 2016, according to Willis Towers Watson. This means the largest fund managers in the world control more money than the total wealth of Europe.

In fact, according to separate research by Credit Suisse, only one continent has greater total wealth than the assets controlled by the top 500 reported – North America, where the total wealth is $92.3 trillion.

The biggest European fund manager is insurance behemoth Allianz with $2.0 trillion and sits in fifth place overall.

France's Axa is in eighth position with $1.5 trillion.

Only one UK fund manager makes the top 20. Legal & General sits in 16th place with $1.1 trillion of assets.

North American managers increased holdings by 7.7 per cent over the period and control $47.4 trillion of assets.

European managers, including the UK, increased by 2.8 per cent to $25.8 trillion. However, UK-based firms saw assets decline for the second consecutive year, falling by 4.5 per cent in 2016 to $6.3 trillion.

"While passive assets remain significantly smaller than actively managed assets, the proportion of passively managed assets has grown from 16.5 per cent to 21.6 per cent over the last five years alone," said Willis Towers Watson global head of manager research Luba Nikulina

We expect that this trend will continue to put downward pressure on traditional fee structures, particularly amongst active managers seeking to remain competitive and to maximise value to investors.